Submitted by Barry Donegan via TheAntiMedia.org, [4]
Following recent media reports of high-profile mass shootings, a Republican assemblywoman from Nevada is calling for an investigation into whether psychiatric pharmaceuticals commonly taken by mass murderers can cause side effects that may contribute to their mental health decline.
According to KSNV Las Vegas, GOP Assemblywoman Michele Fiore says [5] that, rather than blaming mass shootings on the guns used by the perpetrators, studies should be done on the drugs that many of them have a history of having taken to treat mental health disorders.
“We have to look into what is being prescribed and what is in these meds just like clinical studies. Why don’t we do studies on the medication all of these shooters were taking and take that medication off the market? Obviously, medications can alter your mind just as alcohol can alter the mind,” said Fiore.
Though it is not yet known whether the perpetrator in last week’s tragic shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon was on psychiatric medication, early reports from The Oregonian note [6] that he identified himself by the social media screen name “lithium love,” he mentioned anger and depression in a note that was found in connection with the attack, and he had a long history of behavioral problems in school.
He had also been discharged by the U.S. Army midway through basic training in 2008 and graduated from a school that The Oregonian described as “geared for special education students with a range of issues from learning disabilities, health problems and autism or Asperger’s Disorder.”
In August of this year, a CBS46 Atlanta Reality Check report [7] by Ben Swann raised questions about the possibility of a connection between mass murderers and pharmaceutical drugs used to treat mental health disorders, noting that 26 high-profile perpetrators had been taking psychiatric medication.
Watch the Reality Check below.
